MARIO MOLINA, 1943-2020

Born in Mexico City, Mario Molina showed an early aptitude for science. At the age of eleven, he was sent to a Swiss boarding school so that he could learn German, the language of science. At a young age, he converted a bathroom into a lab for experiments. Molina earned his degrees in three different countries: a BS in Chemical Engineering at the National Autonomous University of Mexico; an MS in Applied Chemistry at the University of Freiburg in Germany; and his PhD in Physical Chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley. Molinas plunged into a new territory for his post-doctoral research, that of atmospheric chemistry at the University of California -Irvine. This is where he became interested in the problem of ozone depletion caused by certain inert industrial chemicals. It was for this work in discovering the Antarctic Ozone hole that Molina and F. Sherwood Rowland were awarded the 1995 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Molina was the first Mexican to receive the Nobel in Chemistry.

Molinas served as a tireless advocate and scientific diplomat in bringing about an international agreement to phase out ozone depleting chemicals. He continued his work at M.I.T., the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the California Institute of Technology. Molinas received more than thirty honorary degrees as well as the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom.